These are the two most important questions a radio station can ask themselves. If you can’t or if it takes you several sentences then it’s time to rethink your format, your branding and your overall on-air delivery. Successful stations have succinct and easy to understand elevator pitches because they know exactly who they are and why. 

As a life-long radio nerd who loves to analyze a market and dig into the minutia of how to program radio stations based on that analysis, it’s easy for me to get buried in all that data and miss the obvious if I’m not careful. 

I’ve also fallen into the trap of being too close to a station I personally programmed and losing my perspective. Frankly, it’s hard not to when you live it day in and day out. It’s simply human nature to develop an affection for the station that you work so hard on with people you consider friends. But, that affection can cloud your judgement. 

If you fear you’ve fallen into a similar trap, step back and ask yourself those two questions. 

It’s important to do because your answers should effect every decision you make going forward with the station. Every playlist decision, who voices your imaging, how that imaging is produced, on air content selection, every promotion you do and most importantly everything you pass on doing. 

If you’ve answered those questions well, every one of those decisions will be fairly simple to make. Conversely, incorrectly answering those questions will make it incredibly difficult to make those same decisions. 

Successful stations don’t struggle to tell you who they are and why. They don’t search for words, hem and haw, or have to point to a somewhat similar station to define what they’re doing. They also don’t fall back on having to use stock radio terminology that few people outside of our industry understand. Successful stations are purposeful, strategic, and confident in their direction because they know their identity and are therefore well positioned to build and defend it. 

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